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Mtn 1.5gb For Just N1000 / New From Mtn; 1.5gb Data For N1000 / Exposed, How Mtn Plans To Pay Their 1.4 trilion Naira Fine By Ncc. (2) (3) (4)
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Still On MTN 1.4tr Naira Fine! by sinkhole: 9:26am On Nov 15, 2015 |
ALTHOUGH, majority of Nigerians
are of the opinion that
Telecommunication giant, MTN,
deserve the punishment from the
National Communication
Commission (NCC), which asked it to
pay a whooping N1.04 trillion for
violating regulations relating to SIM
Card registration, few others believe
that the fine is on the high side.
Those who said the punishment is in
order condemned the company for
being too arrogant and not customer
friendly.
The telecommunications firm was
accused of harbouring illegal
database being used by kidnappers,
insurgents, miscreants, armed
robbers and other criminals to
commit crimes, as discovered by
operatives from State Security
Service (SSS).
Authoritative source said a meeting
was held at the NCC headquarters,
on August 4th, after the discovery
by SSS in Abuja. All the
stakeholders were in attendance,
including top NCC officials;
members of the SSS and officials
from the office of the National
Security Adviser.
“Can you imagine that MTN sent
junior officers to attend such an
important meeting? That meeting
was at the instance of the office of
the National Security Adviser and
Director of State Service. This has
become worrisome to the
government that is trying to curtail
the activities of insurgents. Also,
when NCC Enforcement and
Monitoring team went to MTN’s
office for more checks, their officials
declined to open their switches for
inspection,” our source alleged
According to the source, the
behaviour by the service provider
infuriated the NCC team, who in
their report indicted the
telecommunications firm for not
willing to cooperate in the
deactivation of improperly and pre-
registered SIM cards within the
stipulated time, “so there was no
option but to slam them with the
fine.”
The Guardian further gathered that
despite all the entreaties and
warnings over a 12month period
(from September 2014), on the
importance of ensuring that only SIM
cards with valid SIM registration
details are active on
telecommunications networks, MTN
failed to comply with the directive to
deactivate improperly registered
subscribers.
The source said the fine was in line
with sanctions stipulated by SIM
Card Registration Code, Section 19 to
21, where it was stated that per SIM
card found defective on the
network, erring operator will be
made to pay N200, 000.
Expert views on the fine
THE Chairman, Association of
Licensed Telecommunications
Operators of Nigeria (ALTON),
Gbenga Adebayo, said MTN, was yet
to brief the Association on the
development, adding that the fine
could destroy the company if not
reviewed.
“I don’t know how NCC arrived at
the huge amount as fine. But I think
government should urgently
intervene, because it could affect
further investments in the sector. It
is a disincentive to investors and
would have negative impact on the
sector as a whole.”
He urged the operator and regulator
to meet for amicable resolution of
the matter.
The President of the Association of
Telecoms Companies of Nigeria
(ATCON), Lanre Ajayi, condemned
the ‘outrageous’ sanction, saying it
is unacceptable in a
telecommunication industry, which
is still looking for foreign
investment to achieve optimal
telecoms services.
“Yes, I have heard about this
development and I don’t know
where to place it. The board of the
Association of Telecoms Companies
of Nigeria (ATCON) has not met to
look at the issue critically and to
consider the implications to the
industry.
“However, in my view, I believe
strongly that there is nothing wrong
in a regulator imposing a sanction
on erring operator to ensure sanity
in the market, but when such a
regulatory tool is being abused, it
calls for concern. The amount
imposed on MTN is just, to say the
least, outrageous and monumental.
By the time you begin to impose a
sanction, which value is worth more
than half of the investment of the
company, I am afraid, this does not
send good signals to foreign
investors and we need to take
caution.”
The Chief Executive Officer of
Consolidated Management
Consultant, Dele Oguntebi, hailed
the NCC on its action against MTN,
saying it would send the right signal
to other service providers operating
in the country.
He urged the regulator to insist on
the payment of the fine; describing
it as a new dawn in the country, as
laws will henceforth be
implemented the way it is expected.
“I think they should pay because
there are so many issues people will
raise. The regulation is there, but
they violated it deliberately. If they
do that in other parts of the world,
the penalty will be greater. It is only
in Nigeria that people do things and
get out of it. They have done it in
the past. Penalty is another source
of income for Nigeria. We are
looking for money in this country
now to run the government. This is
another source of income for the
government. If you don’t want to be
a source of income, you must obey
the regulations.
To the Chief Executive Officer, RTC
Advisory Services Ltd, Mr. Opeyemi
Agbaje, the huge fine on the
telecommunication firm is
unreasonable, although he agreed
that the company should be
penalised.
“I think the fine is unreasonably
high. I agree that fine is necessary,
but we should not create the
impression that regulators are now
using fines to generate revenue for
the government. The fine is about 40
percent of MTN group’s income. I
will prefer that the parties will sit
down, discuss and arrive at
reasonable conclusion on the matter.
We should not send a message to
other regulators that we can
generate revenue from fines. We
need strong and effective
regulations based on integrity and
public interest. A fraction of the fine
will achieve the same objective, but
this N1.4t is an extreme punitive
measure,” he said.
Worries in South Africa
Meanwhile, the South African
government has expressed worries
about the situation. A cabinet
minister in that country, Jeff
Radebe, said; “This issue is between
MTN and the Nigerian authority.
Obviously, as government, we are
concerned about this matter and we
do hope the talks between MTN and
the Nigerian authorities bear fruit.”
The Head of Parliamentary
Telecommunications Portfolio in
South Africa, Mmamoloko Kubayi, is
of the view that efforts should
channeled towards ensuring that the
sanction did not eventually affect
trade ties between the two
countries.
“It is important for South Africa to
increase trade relations with other
African countries, but if something
like this happens, we get worried
about our reputation and the impact
that would have on South African
companies wishing to expand in the
continent,” Kubayi stressed.
It could be recalled that in August,
the quartet of MTN, Airtel, Glo and
Etisalat, deactivated all lines with
unregistered or improperly
registered mobile subscriber data
on their networks. About 10.7
million lines were disconnected.
This later brought a deluge of
crowds at the various services
centres around the country, as
subscribers tried to reconnect their
lines.
Head of enforcement and monitory
department of NCC, Idehen Efosa,
disclosed that in September 2014,
NCC discovered that from the SIM
data the operators sent to the
commission for hamonisation, some
of them were defective and had to
be returned to the operators for
proper checks.
According to him, about 18.6 million
SIM data were sent back to MTN
Nigeria; 7.49 million to Airtel; 2.23
million to Globacom and 10.46
million to Etisalat.
Idehen, however, said the
monitoring exercise done recently
by the NCC showed that operators
only showed partial commitment to
the exercise.
According to him, out of the about
18.6 million SIM registration data
found to be defective on MTN
network, only about 1.6 million have
been barred. He explained that
what MTN actually did was to put
the affected subscribers on “Receive
Calls Only,” which means the
subscribers cannot put a call
through to another network.
“During our visit to Airtel, the
telecommunications service provider
had fully barred 2.3 million from its
network. These were SIM data found
to be incomplete. At Globacom, 3.5
million lines were barred also from
its network, although with
assurance that others lines found to
be defective on their networks
would be deactivated in 24 hours.
“Etisalat barred 3.3 million and
promised that within 24 hours,
others found to be challenging will
be removed totally from the
networks,” he stated.
MTN shares plummet on JSE
PART of the after effect of the $5.2b
fine has been the plummeting stock
on the Johannesburg Stock
Exchange (JSE). The company’s
stock price dived into free fall when
trading opened on the JSE on the day
the story broke. The shares fell as
much as 8.6 per cent to R144.20 in
Johannesburg.
As at last week, the fallout of the
penalty has resulted in the decline in
MTN shares to about 16 per cent
since the fine was made public two
weeks ago, valuing the company at
289 billion rand ($20.4 billion).
Etisalat battles MTN over voice
tariffs www.ngrguardiannews.com/2015/11/still-on-mtn-ncc-face-off/ |
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